Yesterday I received my modified Ken Bebensee lefty 23" scale five string fretless uke bass. This bass was initially built for use with Pahoehoe silicone rubber uke bass strings and only had a single piezo pickup by open-To-Source Sensors™ and preamp by Audere.
During the initial build I had asked Ken about the possibility of adding a magnetic pickup later in the event that I found a string manufacturer that would be willing to make 23" scale tapewound strings for me. Previously I had contacted D'Addario and LaBella to see if they would be able to and D'Addario said they had no plans to do so and LaBella said they 'couldn't make the intonation work'. Anyways, Ken designed the bass and control cavities to allow for expansion. Several months ago I found a string manufacturer who was willing and able to make custom 23" scale tapes for me, a company called Pyramid Strings in Germany. They have been around for 150 years but I myself had never heard to them until that time. They asked for all the key measurements and the strings fit perfectly. The action past the 12th was very high due to the rubber strings, which are extremely low tension and have a wide vibrational arc. I sent the bass back to Ken to have the action lowered and inquired about adding the magnetic pickup as we discussed. We researched various companies and decided on a Nordstrand Big Blade J 5 pickup and a new Audere preamp, and Ken wanted to replace the OSS piezo with individual piezo saddles from Graph Tech in Canada.
An additional tone knob had to be added and I was emphatic to Ken to try and get it in the back near the bridge in the dark wood area. Problem was, the jack is right in that spot. But luckily the Audere pots are very small and so Ken was able to fit everything like I wanted. Yay!
So after a few months of major surgery Ken finally got everything done and shipped it out last Thursday. Fedex said it would be delivered on Monday (today) so I was out running errands on Saturday and got an email saying they couldn't make delivery since I wasn't home and they would try again Monday. Hmph! I guess Fedex is too efficient! As it turns out I had another item being delivered on Sunday and when Fedex arrived they delightfully dropped off the bass at the same time. Great!
The tapewound action is wonderfully low and the sound palette is totally different so I need time to dial things in. The rubber strings gave a nice 'blooming' bass sound, but there were many annoying idiosyncrasies that I had to deal with which I know I won't miss. After receiving the bass today I immediately threw on a new set of Pyramid strings and checked out the sound. The Nordstrand definitely is midrangey and extremely easy to get the Jaco mwah sound, and the good old 60 cycle hum that was blissfully absent with the piezo only setup has returned. The new piezo setup has no buzz and I think that the individual saddles can be adjusted for volume. Which is good because the A string is much louder than the rest. I will need to contact Ken to see how to bring that level down. But it's fun to play all the 5 string songs that I haven't been able to play for the last few months.
